I’ve seen nothing but black for so long now
Heavy thuds ring in my ears
I lack any organs it seems, I am so empty
So broken
I know no smell but that of human poison
Everything around just sucking life.

But today, I saw a bit of red
A faint red from the corner of my eye
And only for a second.
But colour for the first time in an age.

Is the storm about to stop?
Am I being freed?
Will I be alive again?

I don’t know any of it.
Just that I saw a bit of red today.
Just that I saw a bit of hope today.

They sit in some corner
Ragged, dirty
Ugly to your eyes
Only occasionally your eyes meet theirs
Feel sympathy do some
But contribute nothing.

You go to work, school or college
Same routes
And you find them in that same place every day.

You’ve read about the Sun, haven’t you dear privileged child
You do know that it is the greatest source of energy on this Earth
And you also know that it’s always there, in the same place
No matter how many of you die, are reborn and die again
The Sun will be there
Mighty, powerful.

These people on the street,
(Though they too will perish into the wilderness one day)
Are constants in the place they inhabit for ten, twenty, thirty years.

Why, then are they so powerless, so irrelevant?
Poverty, hunger, capitalism, classism could not defeat them
They stand here despite everything,
They surely are not weak.

Have you wondered, dear privileged, emotionally evolved child, why this life is so unfair?

Hordes of people
Bright and colourful
Kids, college
All smiles and energy
Selfies and streaks in the hair
Backpacks containing weed and books
Talking, smiling, living.

I am so scared
So scared
Of situations I once embraced
Envious of people like whom I once was
These people, around me.

A weird splattering of shivers overtake me as I just stand
In a corner,
With people everywhere
Yet all fucking alone.
I feel like running away from here
Faster than light, like I did last time
But I’ve promised myself that I’ll at least try once
To be normal again.

Fears like these are impossible to explain to anyone
How I feel I’ll faint if an acquaintance or a stranger says hi to me
How I pretend to talk on the phone so people don’t think I am a fucking loner
How I seem to make everything around me awkward
People, conversations, even the weather.

I breathe heavy
Some invisible force these people seem to hold over me dulls my senses
And with a wicked, vicious laugh eats me up.

I feel like crying so hard
But no one will listen.
I can’t take these smiles around me
They are death.
Symbols of an improbable, failed dream.

Hordes of people
Everyone with someone or the else to talk to, some dozens
Brightness, chatter, just college things.

Me,
All alone
The voice inside the only company
Evil smiles of evil people.
Sharp, sweat inducing shivers and heaves.
Tied to an imaginary leash
Unable to move forward
Or even go back.

Stuck,
Held down
Pinned by a giant monster I can’t see or hear or smell, just feel.

But, the question is not whether you’re neon pink or transparent
The question is what lies in the middle
Is there, between the two extremes, an area of fusion and confusion?
No, not grey, because that too is a colour.
Something we all know about but can’t express.
An area that’ll give space to our secret truths
That we ourselves are scared of confronting.
An area where we won’t be governed by the codes of ethics and morality, not scared of being judged for others will have secrets too
An area which truly is colourless
Not transparent.
Maybe invisible,
Maybe a small little place in our own minds
Where we don’t have to adhere to this or that, pursue this or that,
Where we’re happy just the way we are.

Pink or Blue?
Blue, says the world in unison.
A few disagree
But their rebellious voices are drowned out by the cacophony of the majority
These rebellious voices had been screams, but are destined to be mere whispers.

Black or White?
White, says the world in unison.
A few disagree
But their rebellious voices are drowned by the cacophony of the majority
These rebellious voices had been screams, but are destined to be mere whispers.

Privilege is a big thing.
Very few possess it.
Those who do, mostly abuse it.
That is why blue dominates pink
And white, black.

Pink and black voices should never have been ones of rebellion.
That they are is the biggest pronouncement of the world there could have been.

I meet many people who think like me.
Pink or Blue, Black or White,
In the end they all are voices,
They all are colours.

I meet many people who think like this.

Maybe I meet very few people,
Or maybe those with power and position and influence are assholes.
But then it’s the people we interact with everyday that elect them
And I think, maybe I just don’t know how to read people.

And so the many above becomes just a few
But wherever they are, and however minuscule their voices seem to be.
One day, some day, they will drown the voices that rule us right now and admonish them to being insignificant murmurs.
One day, pink and blue and black and white shall lose their individual meanings and all go back to being colours